The Beauty of Our Language

By BILL MARDIS, CJ Editor Emeritus
Commonwealth Journal

January 26, 2009 08:27 am

— “What in the world is that?”
A visitor to the the Commonwealth Journal’s newsroom was laughing at a dog-eared Webster’s Third New International Dictionary lying on an editor’s desk. “Everything in that is on the Internet,” he added.
We beg to differ with our visiting friend. Uncle Noah (Webster) was an awfully smart man ... and he never used the Internet.
The comments got us to thinking. Why would a ragged old dictionary be such a treasured keepsake in the newsroom?
The reason we hang onto this unabridged masterpiece is that it contains all the words, except some newly coined utterances, in the most beautiful language in the world –– the English language.
Who could toss away such wisdom? How could you trash such a treasure?
Using words, a skillful writer can bridge a wide scale of emotions. A well-written article can make you happy; or bring tears to your eyes; or make you angry; or spur you to strive to be your best.
Ah, the power of the printed word! It has made more changes in our world that the Industrial Revolution; or space flight; even the Internet.
Of course, some of you are thinking if you people at the newspaper so value the English language, why do you make so many grammatical errors?
We do. We admit our shortcomings. Grammatical errors are a hazard of the journalistic profession. Newspaper copy is rushed by daily deadlines and many small newspapers simply don’t have professional proofreaders on staff.
Most reporter and editors have a working knowledge of English and we often see our mistakes after we go to press. Nothing can make a dedicated journalist more unhappy that to butcher the English language. My guess is that we worry more about it than our readers.
All of us in this business hold Uncle Noah in high esteem. When Noah was 43, he started writing the first American dictionary. He did this because Americans in different parts of the country spelled, pronounced and used words differently. He thought all Americans should speak the same way.
It took Webster more than 27 years to write his book. When finished in 1828, at age 70, Noah's dictionary had 70,000 words. The treasured old book we hold so dear is a compilation that still bears his name. It has more than 450,000 words that took 757 editor-years to compile.
How could we throw it away? Perish the thought!